


Life Is Not A Love Song

by DetectiveJoan



Series: Stoic Mind, Bleeding Heart [1]
Category: The Bright Sessions (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Episode: 37 Patient #14-A-8 (Rose), M/M, Mutual Mind Manipulation, Sexual Content, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-28
Updated: 2017-12-28
Packaged: 2019-02-23 05:41:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13183518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DetectiveJoan/pseuds/DetectiveJoan
Summary: “Oh, you know the old saying — once bitten, twice mildly paranoid that everyone you’ve ever met is secretly working for the shady government agency that kidnapped you.” Mark's voice is sing-song through the dressing room door.Damien folds his arms. “So what does that make me? The devil you know?”(AU of Episode 37)





	Life Is Not A Love Song

**Author's Note:**

> This is where I usually put content warnings, but how does one comprehensively name triggers potentially found in a narrative where characters deal with trauma by knowingly entering an unhealthy relationship that consists of **mutual dub-con, bordering on abuse and psychological self-harm**?
> 
> It's Mark/Damien. Even in an AU, they're a dead dove.
> 
> Title from ["broken"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AToJekZdLIE) by lovelytheband.

Damien wakes up one morning with his brain all back together, and twenty minutes later Mark knocks on his front door.

“Hey,” Mark says, the very picture of casualness. “Come shopping with me.”

“I’m broke,” Damien says. It’s not what he meant to say, and it’s also not true. And with his ability back, it wouldn’t matter anyway.

“I’m buying,” Mark says.

Damien gives him a skeptical look.

Mark rolls his eyes. “Okay, Joanie’s buying — gave me a credit card when we got back for whatever I need. And today what I need is a wardrobe that hasn’t been sitting in storage for five years, and to be out of the house while the neighbors are doing construction. So, come on.”

“Dr. B’ll be livid if she knows you’re talking to me,” he objects, but he’s pulling on his jacket and stepping over the threshold.

“What my sister doesn’t know won’t hurt her,” Mark shrugs as Damien locks the door. “And she definitely doesn’t know that you got your ability back.”

Damien frowns. “Wait, how do _you_ know that?”

“I can feel you using it, dumbass,” Mark says, gesturing to his own head. “And I mean, I dunno. I just woke up this morning and it was like — I could just tell.”

“So we’re what? Mind-melded together forever now?” It’s not technically the worst thing that could have happened to them, but Damien isn’t exactly ready to celebrate it either.

“Hope not,” Mark replies, still all nonchalance.

He takes Damien to the bus stop across the street.

“You know I have a car,” Damien whines when the bus is three minutes late.

“Yeah, and I have a bus pass and no desire to be kidnapped again.”

Mark says it like a joke, but it still kind of stings.

“For the record,” Damien says as the bus finally pulls up, “I have no desire to have my brain turned inside out again.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Mark says, and he’s...not smirking, exactly. Not even smiling, really, but something in his eyes and his voice is light-hearted.

What the hell is Damien supposed to do with that?

Damien doesn’t have a bus pass, but the driver doesn’t even look at them as they pass him and then scrunch together on a too-small bench near the back.

Mark spends most of the short ride talking Damien’s ear off about some TV show he’s been marathoning on Netflix all week. Apparently, Mark is very into Netflix now.

“I don’t care about any of this,” Damien offers when Mark pauses to pull the stop cord.

“I know,” Mark replies mildly, and then keeps right on talking.

By the time they make it inside the big mall downtown, Mark has switched to a monologue about that time he dyed his hair red.

“Well, I say I dyed it — Joanie did most of the work, of course. It turned out really awful; red’s just not my color, you know? I don’t have your complexion.”

Damien trails him into some big department store that Damien has never before willingly set foot in.

“Am I only here because you want me to be here? Is that how this all works with us now that we both have our abilities back?” he asks as Mark starts shuffling through clothing racks.

Mark’s quiet for a long moment, more like he’s considering the question than ignoring it. “I don’t think so,” he finally says.

“This isn’t exactly how I typically spend my mornings,” Damien points out. Mark isn’t looking at him.

“I know. And I know that I’m sharing your ability, and I want you to be here. But I’ve also got a lot of experience being on the other end of this thing, and it _feels_ like you want to be here too.”

“Couldn’t that just be some kind of feedback loop of you wanting me to want to be here?”

“Could be,” Mark admits, but he sounds unconcerned.

Damien closes his eyes. Mark’s right; if he concentrates he can feel Mark in his brain, and it doesn’t seem like he’s doing this. Hell if that means Damien’s going to admit to participating in a shopping trip of his own volition, though.

When Mark leads him back to the dressing room and latches the door between them, Damien leans against the opposite wall.

“Why do you want me to be here?” he asks.

“I miss spending time with your sparkling personality.”

Damien waits. He watches Mark’s feet step into a new pair of jeans.

“You’re...safe,” Mark says eventually.

Damien snorts. “A half hour ago you were haranguing me about kidnapping you. What the hell is ‘safe’ supposed to mean?”

“It means you’re a dick, Damien,” Mark replies, with an eye roll loud enough to be heard through the door. “But if you actually wanted to hurt me, you would’ve done it months ago. Plus, I can use your ability to make everyone else leave me alone.”

“You agoraphobic now?”

“Oh, you know the old saying — once bitten, twice mildly paranoid that everyone you’ve ever met is secretly working for the shady government agency that kidnapped you.” His voice is sing-song.

“So what does that make me? The devil you know?”

The latch clicks and Mark swings the door open. He’s wearing — shit, Damien doesn’t know enough about fashion to describe any of it, but the jeans are all tight and slung low around his hips, and the shirt is well-fitted in a way that shows off that Mark’s put on some muscle in the weeks since Damien last saw him.

“Call me crazy,” Mark says with a self-deprecating smile.

“You look really good,” Damien says, because there’s no way around that truth.

He wants to kiss Mark; the thought is there and gone again.

And then there again.

Fuck, he shouldn’t be staring like this.

“Thanks.” Mark’s smile turns genuine, then mischievous. “Not that I brought you for your stellar fashion sense.”

“What’s wrong with my fashion sense?” Damien asks, genuinely taken aback.

“Well, you’re wearing a motorcycle jacket for one,” Mark says. “And it’s not even your color, for two. I told you, you’d look better in red.”

“I — you — maybe I _like_ motorcycle jackets,” he stutters indignantly.

“I hope you do, considering how many you own,” Mark teases.

“You’re very rude,” Damien responds, but there’s no real bite in it. He can’t remember if he’s ever had a conversation like this, with this weird underlying sense of camaraderie. He feels confused. Dizzy.

“But I’m also handsome and fashionable, we just agreed,” Mark crows, shutting the door between them again.

“I didn’t say you were handsome,” Damien objects, but Mark just laughs.

Damien waits semi-patiently while Mark goes through several more potential outfits — and looks fantastic in every stitch, the bastard — before finally declaring himself satisfied. He even looks better dressed back in his own clothes than Damien remembers from that morning; Mark’s pushed the sleeves up to his elbows, and the V of the shirt frames the hollow of his collarbone invitingly.

“Come on, let’s get out of here.” Mark takes his hand. Damien doesn't squeal about it because he's not twelve years old.

On the way to the register, they pass a makeup counter, and Mark stops dead in his tracks. He drops Damien’s hand and pulls a tube of lipstick off the rack.

“This,” he says, brandishing it in Damien’s face almost victoriously, “ _this_ is your exact color.”

“No fucking way,” Damien says reflexively. He can’t even tell what color it’s supposed to be; lipstick is perplexing. God knows what made Mark pounce on that particular stick — actually, God knows why Mark was looking at the lipstick and thinking about Damien at all.

Mark waves the tube a little. “Aw, don’t tell me you’re scared of a little makeup.”

Damien snatches it out of Mark’s hand. He’s way too predictable, but fuck it. When he twists it open, the stick is...some dark reddish shade he couldn’t name. Maroon? Burgundy? Some fancy color name he’s never heard of? The label says Impatient Wine, which probably means something to Mark.

“For your information, I used to wear eyeliner all the time —” Damien starts, not sure what he’s trying to prove with that information

Mark snorts, “Oh, I bet the girls in high school were falling all over you.”

“But I don’t know what to do with this.”

Marks sets his pile of purchases on the counter, then beckons Damien closer and takes the lipstick back. He holds Damien’s jaw with his free hand.

Damien swallows heavily before Mark slowly drags the lipstick along his bottom lip. He follows it with a finger, carefully wiping away the excess. He repeats the process on his upper lip, then caps the tube and sets it on the counter.

“There,” he says, surveying his handiwork. Damien does his best not to blush under the scrutiny.

Mark’s hand is still on Damien’s face.

“You clean up pretty good,” Mark adds.

Damien’s chest is so tight it almost feels hard to breathe.

Mark licks his lips.

“Are you doing this?” Damien asks quietly.

“Doing what?”

Damien closes his eyes like that’ll make it easier to get the words out. “I want you to kiss me,” he admits. Just saying it out loud makes his stomach do some kind of somersault. “Do I _actually_ want that, or are you hijacking my ability?”

“I think both,” Mark says. He pulls Damien subtly closer. “On a feedback loop. I want to kiss you, and you want me to kiss you, and I want you to want me to kiss you, and you —”

Damien doesn’t kiss him to shut him up, but it’s an added bonus to the way his whole chest feels like a bonfire as soon as his lips meet Mark’s.

Mark wraps his other arm around Damien’s shoulder and pulls him closer until Damien’s standing with one of his thighs pressed between Mark’s legs. Damien curls his hands into the back pockets of Mark’s jeans.

Their kisses are slow enough that Damien catches every detail of the way the lipstick smears onto Mark’s lips. Marks’ nails scratch against his scalp, almost softly. When Damien grinds his hips against him, Mark makes a soft moan.

And then, suddenly, Mark’s gone.

When Damien opens his eyes, Mark has scrambled back five feet and, apparently, tripped backwards. He’s sitting in the middle of the aisle, staring at Damien with wide eyes.

Damien doesn’t know what to do.

Which matches nicely with how he doesn’t know what’s going on.

Nothing today has gone the way he expected.

“This is a bad idea,” Mark says. His fingers are hovering over his lips, covering his mouth but not touching.

“Which part?” Damien asks.

“Which —” Mark echoes incredulously. “Jesus, Damien, which part of making out seems like a _good_ idea to you?”

“The part where we both seemed to be enjoying it?” He’s not sure why he says it like a question.

Mark runs his fingers through his hair, and looks down at the ground. He doesn’t answer.

“The part where we both wanted it,” Damien adds, more certain.

“That feedback loop,” Mark says slowly, “was fucking intense.”

He finally meets Damien’s gaze, and Damien’s heart skips a beat.

“I think you should leave,” Mark says. “Until we figure out what we’re doing.”

Objectively, it sounds like a good plan, but Damien still wants to cross the distance between them, crawl onto Mark’s lap, and kiss him until —

“Fine.” Damien spits it more harshly than he intended, around gritted teeth.

He pockets the lipstick as he stalks away.

/ / /

Damien doesn’t believe in guilt. Or regret, really. They’re a waste of time. Even if he’d done something worth regretting — which, generally, he hasn’t done, because mind manipulation isn’t really something he _does_ , it’s just something that happens to people when he’s around, okay, the word “ability” has never been a very accurate description for this thing he’s never really been able to control — even if he’d done something wrong, guilt and regret still couldn’t change anything. What was done was done, the end, no use looking back on it.

So maybe their little impromptu road trip hadn’t been something that Mark would have exactly chosen for himself. So what. They were home now, free from the A.M., and all put back together. No harm done, really.

It had been years since he’d kissed someone, but it basically went by the same logic. Maybe Mark wouldn’t have chosen it completely of his own accord, but it’s not like Damien had exactly chosen it either.

It just happened.

Sometimes things just happened.

Around Damien, things just happened a lot.

And if Damien wanted it to happen again, well, that didn’t necessarily guarantee it was going to. Especially not when it came to Mark. Sure, Dr. B had gotten pretty good at holding her own against his ability, and that mind-reader freak was annoyingly immune, but Mark was different.

With his mimic ability functioning, his brain felt slippery, like Damien’s desires could only latch on if he were concentrating hard enough. Not to mention Mark could give as good as he got. Sharing his ability with Mark, feeling Mark’s own desires skate on the surface of his mind, was completely different than having his ability flipped inside out. That had been frustrating, unrelenting vulnerability.

This thing with Mark just felt like connection.

/ / /

Damien gives it three days and then calls Mark. Thank God Dr. B is enough of a Luddite to still have a landline.

“I found my eyeliner,” Damien informs Mark as soon as he answers.

“Does it look as 90s teen movie villain as it sounds?”

“If you find 90s teen movie villains attractive, I guess.”

Mark’s sigh is loud even through the static of the speaker. “You know, when I said we needed to figure out what we were doing, I didn’t think the answer was going to be phone sex.”

Damien nearly drops the phone.

“I’m — that’s not what this is,” he blurts.

When Mark replies, he sounds mildly patient and infinitely amused. “Has anyone ever told you you’re notoriously bad at thinking things through? Where else could that conversation possibly go?”

“Screw you, Bryant.”

“Oh, come on —”

Damien hangs up.

Mark calls back a minute later. Damien accepts the call and holds the phone to his ear without saying anything.

“So, uh,” Mark clears his throat, and even in those two sounds Damien can hear him holding back a laugh. “What are you wearing?”

Damien flops on his back across the couch. “A motorcycle jacket,” he says. “Why are you really calling?”

“Phone sex isn’t a good enough reason?”

Damien lets the silence stretch.

“I don’t know,” Mark admits after the pause gets uncomfortable. “What do you want me to say? I wanted to talk to you?”

“If it’s true.”

Mark takes a deep breath. “It’s complicated.”

He rolls onto his side, props himself up on one elbow. “I’ve got time.”

“I think I’m supposed to hate you,” Mark says. “I know I am. And I do. Sometimes. I mean, I’m always kinda angry at you, but not more than I’m angry at Joanie, if that makes sense.”

“Hating me as much as you hate all the other people in your life sounds like a really solid foundation for a relationship,” Damien drawls. Not like Damien’s ever been in a relationship before. Mind control tends to freak out potential partners.

“There are plenty of people I hate significantly more than you, Damien. But sure, none of my current relationships are exactly ideal,” Mark admits. “I have the feeling you and I have that in common.”

The closest thing Damien has to a relationship with another human being is whatever he has going on with Dr. B — or whatever he’d had going on with Dr. B. After he’d gotten his ability back he’d told her exactly what she could do with her useless therapy bullshit, and she’d crisply told him to go to Hell. So, yeah, maybe he shouldn’t be judging this thing with Mark too harshly.

“Look, do you wanna come over or not?” he says.

“That still seems like a bad idea,” Mark hedges.

“That’s not what I asked.”

There’s a shuffling sound on the other end of the line, and then Mark says, “Yeah. Fuck it. I’ll be there in twenty.”

/ / /

Damien’s still on the couch fifteen minutes later when Mark knocks on the door sharply and then lets himself in. The effect of Mark’s presence is instantaneous; Damien’s mouth goes dry and his heartbeat is suddenly racing.

Mark kicks off his shoes in the entryway, and crosses the room; he stops directly in front of Damien.

“Hi, honey,” Damien says, reaching up to drag Mark into a kiss. It’s faster, messier than it had been before, all sharp teeth as Mark moves forward until he’s straddling Damien’s legs. Mark shrugs his jacket onto the floor and then tugs Damien’s t-shirt over his head. He’s still pushing; Damien allows himself to fall sideways, and then Mark’s lying on top of him, weight heavy as he kisses down Damien’s neck.

Damien’s never been this hard this fast in his life. His brain is full of nothing but Mark and everything he wants to do with him. He wants Mark to bend him over the table and fuck him roughly; he wants Mark to push him onto his knees and use his mouth until Damien’s throat is torn and sore; he wants Mark to tie him to the bed and ride him slowly until he’s begging to be allowed to touch.

And all of that is subsumed by how much he wants _this_ , Mark biting across his neck and chest, pressing him deep into the couch cushions as they grind against each other and Damien digs his nails into Mark’s skin.

They come like that, first Mark and then, with Mark’s palm rubbing against the length of him through his jeans and Mark’s breath hot against his cheek, Damien.

“Jesus Christ,” Damien breathes.

“Eloquent as always,” Mark says, collapsing against Damien’s chest, and Damien can hear his grin.

Damien curls his arms around him automatically and listens to Mark’s breathing slow.

“Is it always that intense? With your ability?” Mark asks after a few minutes.

“Nope. Pretty sure that was the feedback loop.”

“Jesus,” Mark echoes softly.

/ / /

Damien doesn’t remember drifting off, but when he wakes up Mark is sitting on the end of the couch, pulling his shoes on.

“You going somewhere?” Damien asks. His head hurts, and he feels muddled and groggy; taking a nap in the middle of the day does that to him.

“I’ve gotta get home before Joanie does,” Mark says. “She’d absolutely kill me if she knew I was here, even if she didn't know why.”

Damien wedges his feet under Mark’s leg. “Coming over just to fuck and then leaving right after is kind of a skank move, Bryant.”

“Sorry we didn’t cuddle long enough, dear,” Mark teases. “I’ll make it up to you next time.”


End file.
